Moving again...anybody sick of it?

Now that people are going back to college, here are my 2 cents on moving (which I'm doing next month).

I really hate to move. Not so much the physical labor of moving things (that's the easy part) but the realization that

1. There's been SO much junk I've accumulated and have to throw away2. All those things I thought that might be useful in the future turned out to be useless 5 years later3. Packing is so much harder than unpacking.4. The dust!5. I have to do this all over again eventually.

I've managed to get rid of a lot of things these past couple of years. All the stuff that really matters to me can fit inside of a cargo van, which is cheaper to rent. All the other stuff is cheap-o Ikea furniture that I can either sell/give/trash.

I've had over 30 major moves, and moved friends on 8 other occasions. No exaggeration, I sat here and tallied them, and I suspect I missed a few. To friends I became the "Mover-in-Chief" with all my experience, planning and executing their moves for them.

Of course most of it was due to the US Army. Even when I had a fairly stable assignment, government quarters often weren't available right away, so I had to take temporary lodging for a few months to a year, before being assigned my permanent housing. And then in a year or 2 do it all over again, all through my career. Not to mention living out of duffle bags and suitcases as part of my duties, hardly home anyway.

And since retiring it's been little better, 7 residences in the last 10 years. At 4 years this is the longest I've ever stayed in one place since I was 20, 42 years ago. And now hubby says he'd like to move! ARRRGGGHHHH!!!

I've abandoned any thoughts I'll ever have a place to settle down, instead be a gypsy to the end of my days. And along the way I had to part with lots of stuff, the family heirloom things the toughest. Most of them and photographs were lost to floods and other mishaps. Now I have very few possessions, back where I started as a little kid. They say you leave the world as you entered it, and I know I sure will. There'll be no estate sale when *I* depart.

For the 8 years of undergrad and medical school plus some of my PGY-1, I only took with me what fit in my Honda Civic. Seriously. An air mattress, a small plastic folding table+a folding chair were my only furniture. I never had a TV. I had a laptop after my junior year in college . I never bough music or movies. Moving took only about 3 hrs of packing and putting crap from kitchen and bathroom+clothes along with my books into the car.

Now that I have a house and a family, I can sympathize with you. There is a lot of useless crap I can't bear to throw away. The garage probably has as much stuff as the rest of the house.

You should put all your music from cassettes and CDs onto a hard drive or something. And throw the cassettes and CDs away.

There is a reason why moving is listed as one of the most stressful life events - to be frank, it sucks!

I'm moving myself on the 31st (ugh!!!) and the place I'm in now is the longest I've lived anywhere (bar growing up) at 8 years and the amount of stuff (crap) I've accumulated is unreal. I've found stuff I thought I had thrown out and replaced, I've found stuff I deluded myself into buying thinking I'd look good in it or that I've kept thinking I'll fit back into it. I've found stuff still in the shopping bags from the stores and still with the tags on.

This entire weekend was spent sorting and tossing and now, the place looks like a tinker's camp. I will be so happy when this move is over. Though of course, that leaves the unpacking...sigh.

I have moved quite a bit in my life and as a result I don't have too many material items other than enough now to furnish my small apartment. I have never understood those people who collect all this material "stuff" and then complain about it. We spend all of our lives collecting things then have to get rid of of it; I don't get it.

Oh I'm taking it easy. I'm just moving across town, and I have to ride out an extra month on my current place (because they require an extra month of notice), so I'm just moving 1 car-ful of stuff each time, and I got the whole month to do it.As opposed to my last move which required REAL packing...

MuchMoreThanMuscle saidOnly thing that would be hard for me to move are my plants and multiple fish tanks.

Agreed MMtM

Moved 5 times in one year in college, and I think that has put me off moving for a while. I was really good at it by the fifth time of course. I resorted to keeping fish in translucent plastic rubbermaid bins, since they were far easier to move than glass aquariums.

I'm half tempted to dig up my more sentimental plants (that I grew from itty bitty seeds and have taken years to mature and flower) when I move. They're like my dysfunctional, low maintenance children I pay attention to every spring and fall, but I still love them.